Lower speeds at regional intersections

A plan to temporarily lower speed limits on regional highway intersections when approaching side-road traffic is detected may not work for motorcycles.

The technology has been initially installed at the intersection of Glenelg Highway and Dunkeld-Cavendish Road and Penshurst-Dunkeld Road, near Dunkeld, Victoria, and will be rolled out across the state.

Watch this video to see how it works.

The problem for riders is that it uses the same inductor loop technology deployed at traffic lights that often fails to detect small motorcycles.

Another band aid solution… rather than actually fixing the real problem(s)… How much is going too cost vs how many lives it actually saves?
Just another attempt to be seen to be doing something, however pointless or stupid….
groan…

There are similar speed reductions – though fixed signs not dynamic – for a number of intersections on the M420/B420 in Victoria … rather than drop suddenly from 100 to 70, they do it in a graduated way – from 100 to 90 to 80 (or 70) over a longer distance. It actually works pretty well.

I suspect for these dynamic signs though, the distance you’d have to start the decrease would be too long for it to be timely as cars would already have passed the first marker before the side road triggers the notification.

As long as the 100 to 70 notification is clear and there’s a buffer (so a bike can slow safely without being tailgated) it would actually be better than fixed reductions. Curious how self-driving cars will cope…

An addition to intersection accidents is, we were always taught to ‘look right, look left, then right again” before proceeding, but…..
I see close to 100% of drivers about to turn or turning across traffic, look in the direction of the side of the road they with to move onto for approaching vehicles, paying very little attention to what they’re going to cross in front off.
Secondly, I’ve also noticed many drivers using a very cursory glance, almost a pretend look rather than actually carefully looking before moving off at give-way or stop signs.

The cynical of us will suspect that this is another thinly disguised attempt at revenue grabbing instead of actually doing something that works.
The biggest problem with intersections like this is poor design and bad drivers.
Most often the problem is a lack of merge area and massive signs blocking the view of on coming traffic. The other problem is drivers who bought their license off a cereal box and plug their brains into anything but paying due care and attention.

Whilst I cannot find anything the article says wrong, all it does is cater to the bad driver like everything else that is being done , when are they going to wake up and realise the only way to seriously reduce the carnage on the roads is

1. Raise the driver standard to a higher level , much better instruction and much higher testing levels are needed , at the moment the driver standard is so low as to barely be able to call it a standard .
2. A change in driver attitude is needed , driving is a privilege, not a right and every one out there on the road needs to give everyone else some consideration and respect . At the moment out there it seam as if everyone acts as it’s there right to do as they please and f*%k everyone else , this attitude has got to be changed.
These two things would change the face of driving , not the constant slowing down of everyone every time there is a chance that some poor driver is going to do something wrong .

Hi Mark, Good article. I know of only one crash in the last 5 years and that was a European tourist (it just means I did not hear of the other one). The tourist probably looked the wrong way and from my experience riding around Europe this is easy to do. The big difference is that when I do it in Europe the drivers are drivers and anticipate you just may ride out in front of them, whereas here we have a god given right to just drive through anyone who breaks the law by not giving way. This highway slowing down will not change anything until the Australian driver learns to drive. I can think of many other intersections that have a large number of crashes and injuries in the local area that need fixing, like the Genelg Hwy and George St in Hamilton, it is just a death trap unlike the one in the article.
Anthony Morrison